First Chance or Last Chance?

Ted Folkert – September 1, 2018

They say you only get one chance to make a first impression. That could very well be true. But making a first impression isn’t the only place where we may only get one chance. Which brings up a much more serious problem. We probably only get one last chance for making some strategic decisions about the sustainability of our planet. Apparently, if we choose to listen to our scientists, we may now have our last chance to save this planet for human habitation in future centuries, much to the denial of our simple-minded president.

Now that our president has as his mission the walking-back of everything that took place during the Obama administration, and his mission of ignoring all of these “ridiculous” warnings of climate change being mouthed about by these evil Democrats, and his mission to promote a stronger economy with massive wealth to be garnered by those who pursue it and who have the rules on their side to get it done, he has proceeded to block, change, ignore, and set aside any and all measures to deal with the real debacle that hovers over mankind.

The real debacle is not a faltering economy, it isn’t threats from foreign countries which force him to show off his bravery and make idle threats of warfare while strutting about our powerful military, it isn’t abusive taxation which threatens the lessening of massive wealth – no, the real debacle, the debacle that could end it all without us ever pulling a trigger or dropping a bomb, is global warming, that annoying term which our president calls a hoax while ignoring the stated belief and frequent warnings of nearly 100% of the scientists on Earth.

The common belief, and one which already has empirical evidence of an unbearable outcome, is that the warming oceans, which are fueled by carbon emissions which provide a blanket around our planet which traps the heat within our atmosphere, is and will continue to cause the oceans to rise, eating away at the land on which we live, and will cause the deserts to expand, eating away at the land on which we live, and the air we breathe will become more toxic with no method of cleansing it for life sustainability, and the climate favorable for growing crops and raising livestock will increase and provide an unfavorable impact on food production – and the list goes on.

Our scientists tell us that 80% of the remaining fossil fuels on Earth need to be left in the ground if we want to save the planet for ongoing human habitation or perhaps life of any kind. Well, our brilliant president knows better. He knows that this is all a hoax and therefore sets in motion the process of expanding coal production, oil production, offshore drilling, and probably, if he can find a way, nuclear power production – all the very processes which our scientists declare to be the fuel of our demise.

This policy of short term financial gain for the rich and powerful, a group which our president claims to be a part of, takes precedence over long term economic stability through increased equality of income and wealth. Of course, so long as our saber-rattling president (the same one with the bone spurs) can continue to amass a fortune for he and his heirs, nothing else matters one iota. We all are coming to realize that his entire plan to conquer the presidency was to enhance his own wealth and to garner some relief from the Russians who have lent him billions and have him over a barrel, obviously in more ways than one. All this seems apparent as we watch him pursue his romance with Vladimir Putin, the former strongman for Russian dictators and who is now a murderous dictator himself, and who seems to hold our president’s image and financial survival in his hand. This, of course, has inspired cartoons of Putin walking around with our president on a leash, a cartoon which has too much reality to be very humorous.

We have gone from perhaps the most admired and respected country in the world to probably the laughing stock of the world. And why not? We stood by and allowed this president who has been labeled as stupid, idiotic, hedonistic, narcissistic, rude, ungrateful, self-centered, and pathetic, become elected as the leader of the richest and most powerful country on Earth while we watched from the sidelines, assuming we didn’t need to enter the game. We didn’t even care enough to assure that we had two good candidates to choose from and then we didn’t care enough to elect the best of the two less-than-the-best candidates we were offered.

We have an opportunity to start atoning for the errors of our negligence, for correcting the errors of our lack of involvement to assure an ongoing stable country, for starting on the road back to an intelligently administered country and generous world leader, an admired nation of laws and not of men, an example of the rewards of free-enterprise, democracy, and equality of opportunity. And above all, a country whose leaders recognize the perils that stand before us and our obligation to future generations to take steps within our control to eliminate the eventual destruction of life on the planet.

Maybe we can render meaningless the cliché which could serve as our future epitaph: “the operation was a success, but the patient died.”

This first opportunity to instill change is in the November elections. We have an opportunity to elect state governors, federal legislators, and many other governmental officials who will have more respect and concern for the good of the state and nation than for their personal welfare, elected officials who will serve the nation and not themselves, officials who will understand the value of equality of opportunity and the rule of law.

We should take heed to something that Louis Brandeis is quoted as having said many years ago: “We may have democracy, or we may have wealth in the hands of the few, but we can’t have both.”

It seems possible that if we don’t improve our leadership, we may not be able to have either.

Think about it!